Looking Back
by tomecat
Summary: Sirius' personal reflection's from inside his cell in Azkaban


Disclaimer: I own nothing! I confess! I'm a worthless, talentless, wanna-be-J.K. Rowling-loser, and I own nothing that is related to Harry Potter! Sniff

I just wanted to be cool.

Looking Back

Nobody ever told me when I was growing up that I could be anything I wanted to be. Nobody told me anything that would satisfy my curiosity of the world around me. So much of my childhood was shadowed by uncertainty, and it took me years to decipher what my past was really full of: lies.

Of course when you are unaware of the lies surrounding you…..well, let's say that it reaffirms the old saying, "Ignorance is bliss." Oh, I was always knew something, somehow was wrong, but it was always muted. It popped up when something didn't seem quite right, like a splinter in the back of my mind.

My parents told me they loved me, but it was if they were required to. Even from a young age I could feel that my treatment as a person would soon shift from demeaning to sadistic. …I remember the first time my father hit me. Kreacher retrieved me from the platform, and I somehow knew a bit of my sanity had been left behind with that scarlet train.

The house was dark and foreboding, just like I remembered it. Nobody said a word until halfway through dinner. Always the ray of sunshine, Kreacher skulked about grumbling, but now I was the subject of his mutterings. As he walked behind me, I heard the words 'filth' and 'mudblood lover'.

I lost it. I shouted at him to shut his ugly face (he really was ugly), when my mother started screaming. She got up and stood right over me, screaming about how I was mingling with filth, that I had betrayed not only the Black family but the ideals of purebloods everywhere.

I tried to sit quietly. I really did. Its hard to sit still while someone tells you you're worthless. So I lived up to my parent's opinion of me and became a failure. I sprang out of my seat, shouting that she didn't know anything about me, and that she was stupid and ugly and stupid. Not a great comeback, but then again I was twelve.

To this day I don't know how long my father had bee standing near me. All I remember was my mothers eyes narrowing, and then I was spun around and my father struck me across the face. I remember hitting the floor, hard. I remember my father's voice very far away, telling me I had no right as a traitor to speak in that manner, and I was to remain in my room until they sent for me.

I stumbled up the stairs. I finally accepted what my family really was. From that day on, I hated the summer holidays. I begged and pleaded with Dumbledore to make up some sort of a fake study program so I could stay at my friends' houses or at least Hogwarts, but it was out of his hands. Something about forging documents to one of the most powerful pureblood families probably wasn't the best idea, but every year I arrived with a note I made myself in terrible handwriting, hoping he'd sign it.

Somehow I endured. I lived for the school term. When I was there, we had fun and we were respected. That was something I never had at home: respect. At home I was an embarrassment. At school I was an idol, an icon, I was incredible. Then came that fateful summer.

After a while, you become numb to insults. The constant sting becomes a sort of painful tingle. But every once in a while, they lash out and draw blood. My father had always been good at luring prey. He came in for his sporadic lashing of my pride and started with the usual: traitor, shameful, betrayer. I was sitting there, silently numb to his words, wondering when my parents would keel, hoping it would be soon. But then, he punctured me.

"Of course you wouldn't retaliate. You've been softened by those filthy Gryffindors. Especially your little love, James Potter. Had I known you'd adhere to someone who fucks mudbloods I'd never have sent you to that school."

I snapped. I screamed that he and my mother were idiots and that he had no right to talk about my friends. He began to hit me, and I took it, until I realized….I wasn't twelve anymore.

I feigned a fall, then threw a quick punch right into his pompous face. I turned to run but he must've picked up his wand. He hit me with the Cruciatus Curse. Blinding pain enveloped me, but somehow I managed to kick out. As he fell, I stumbled to my feet, out of the room, out the front door, and broke into a dead run down the street. I didn't know if they would come after me, but I didn't care. I did the only thing that made sense. I ran to James' house.

The Potter's accepted me as their own son. Not that they didn't have enough to deal with as it was with James and Voldemort and everything else, but they accepted me all the same. They were a real family, and they included me, like it was just that simple. I had never woken up to a house where somebody hugged you, asked how you slept while they made you breakfast. I loved it.

I put so much of my heart into the Potters and James was like a brother. I was his friend, his family, his best man, his son's godfather, and I should've been his secret-keeper! I was so stupid! How could I let Peter, of all people…..

That's all I can do now: regret. Once again I'm a prisoner in a terrible place. Only this time I deserve it.

Harry…….Lily……………..…………….James…………….


End file.
